Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, the Delahunt-Boehlert amendment would gut section 5. There is a legal fiction as to whether or not a court can order the increase of tax or a court can order a municipality to increase tax. Our bill provides in both situations a court will be prevented from directly or indirectly raising taxes. What the amendment does, it prevents a court from directly raising taxes, but all the courts have to do is to read Missouri versus Jenkins and instead of the court directly raising the tax, it says ``I am ordering you to raise the tax.'' The Delahunt-Boehlert amendment would allow a Federal judge, as the judge in Rockford, Illinois, has done, to point to a duly elected school board and say, ``Either you raise taxes or you are going to jail.'' That is the purpose of section 5. If the amendment is adopted, the Delahunt-Boehlert amendment, it will not affect the situation. The judge can still do the same thing. And it is legal fiction which they are presenting before this body today to allow them to have all of the congressional mandates come before the Federal courts and for the Federal courts to say, local municipalities to comply, either raise taxes or go to jail.”